The Waiter Chroncles: Mix Tapes

In the service sector, your co-workers are everything. They can make your work miserable, or they can make it tolerable. Some may even make this otherwise demeaning work enjoyable.

Meet Pepe, the 21 year-old uber-waiter who has quickly become my favorite person in this strange place. Sarcastic, generous, and full of energy, Pepe makes even the most stressful lunch shift fun. He does this with little gestures: waving his arm in the air and proclaiming, "that's whassup!" as you precariously balance a tray full of entrees; executing short bursts of crump-dance maneuvers; answering the most distressed questions with quips like, "I don't know. All I know is that I'm handsome."

Seriously, being a waiter at the Ristorante would be much, much worse if not for Pepe.

Among other things, he has an encyclopedic knowledge of popular music, which he uses to decorate the most basic of conversations. Which is why my restaurant vocabulary includes "Ay Bay Bay" and "Hyphy," linguistic nuggets I'm hard pressed to defend in any other setting. It's a quality I admire, even if Pepe's musical catalogue is predominately rap and hip-hop.

Out of this admiration, I suggested a mix tape project. That's right, mix tapes (cd's, really). I'm a 31 year old ordained minister, and I just traded mix tapes with another guy. And it was totally my idea.

I offered up The Decemberists, Feist, The Bobby Hughes Experience, Maximo Park, Metric . . .

Pepe produced E-40, Bow Wow, Hurricane Chris, Mike Jones, Nas, Lil' Boosie, The Federation . . .

It's fun, if nothing else.

And a little childish.

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"Nice Makeup Dude"

From Jerilyn's comment on the previous post.

Thanks. I still haven't washed it off.

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Windell Middlebrooks Update

I recently had a chance to catch our favorite fictional beer vendor's spin on Entourage, the uber-popular HBO yarn about an A-list actor and his crew.

It's a good little role. Here's a link to the episode (Windell's scene begins at 19:35).

A warning to SC alum: your favorite son uses some adult language in this scene.

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The Waiter Chronicles Survey Winner

The winning answer to the survey question about the food handler's test came from Michael:

"Cockroaches and rodents like to feed . . .

a. while you are taking tests, so get back to work!

Nice job Michael. The next time you're in the IE, feel free to handle some food; you're honorarily certified so to do.

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Phone Interview

Yesterday I had a phone interview with the Associate Pastor Nominating Committee from a nearby church. For those who don't know, Presbyterian churches look for pastors and associate pastors by forming Pastor/Associate Pastor Nominating Committees (PNC's/APNC's). That committee's job is to compose the position description, circulate it, interview candidates, and, ultimately, recommend one for the congregation to vote on.

This process almost always utilizes a phone interview.

I can't think of a less effective way for a group of people to assess the merit of a candidate than a phone interview (maybe email would be worse). There is no room for complexity in a phone interview, either in your interaction with the interviewers or the composition of your responses to their questions.

For example, one person asked me what I thought about the current "struggle" in the PC (USA) over inclusion. Now, that's a very intentional way of framing that issue, and it immediately gives something away about the church's theological leaning (another church might have asked about the struggle over "homosexuality" or "Biblical authority"). So, it's a complex question about an even more complex issue. But what you're required to do in a phone interview is make your best guess as to what they're really asking, and then speak into the ether for about five minutes. You won't have the benefit of gauging their reaction. You won't be able to clarify something that comes off as confusing. You just have to fire away and hope you don't wildly miss the mark.

By the end of the interview, the moderator of the committee said they would be getting back to me "right away." That means it either went really well or very badly. I guess I'll know soon enough.

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The Waiter Chronicles Survey: The Test

If you live in Riverside County and work in a job where you handle food, you have to get a Food Handler's Card. Getting this card means trekking down to the local environmental health office and paying $18 to take a 50 question multiple choice test. You're only allowed to miss 15 questions if you are to pass.

And if you are troubled, dear citizen, by the thought that some of the men and women handling the food you're eating are only about 70% clear on what will make you sick and what won't, let the sheer difficulty of that test put your fears to rest.

Eh-hem.

Test takers are given a short booklet to study before they start penciling in the bubbles. Feeling confident, I flipped through the first few pages of it, then declared myself ready to be examined. I was more ready than I knew.

If this test is a measurement of the need-to-know involved in food service, then it appears that little more is needed than a basic grasp of English and a healthy appreciation for sarcasm. Because, while a few of the questions pertain to details--the temperature at which food grows bacteria, for example--most of them are mind-numbingly ridiculous.

Here's an example (and I paraphrase):

Cockroaches and rodents like to feed
a. when the manager is not around
b. when they're stressed
c. when it is dark and quiet
d. on Mondays and Thursdays

(Duh. Everybody knows the answer is "a," with a postscript, "depending on the manager.")

It got so bad at one point that I actually looked around the room to see if other test takers were as amused as I was. I also suspected I might be the unwitting subject of a hidden camera prank. Nope. My colleagues were all furrowing their brows and engaging the exam with full seriousness.

You will be relieved to know that I am now the proud possessor of a Riverside County Food Handler's Card. That's right, when it comes ot roaches, mice, flies, and rotting food, I'm bonafide.

So here's the survey: submit your best multiple choice answer option "e" for the question about mice and rodents. The actual answers will be hard to beat, I know, but give it a shot. Because the best answer wins its author an Honorary Riverside County Food Handler's Certification.

May the Food Handler's Force be with you.

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The Waiter Chronicles: After Work

I'm riding shotgun in westbound bass-thumping Mustang, heading to an unknown midnight destination. I only know it's a Mexican bar and that Junior is friendly with one of the bartenders. We're 15 miles out of town now, still speeding into the valley darkness, and as we enter and exit Ontario like a knife through butter I start to wonder: "are we going into LA?"

Not LA, ultimately, but Chino. A few years ago this would have freaked me out, going out for drinks with people I don't know all that well at one of their personal hangouts. But now I don't care. It hardly even bothers me that Junior and Pepe have thoroughly out-dressed me. They're both in collared shirts, black pants, and shiny shoes; Pepe is even sporting a sleevless pullover sweater. The best I could do for this midweek after-work outing is a brown T-shirt with Pac Man on the front. My companions don't seem to care, so I don't either.

We pull up to the bar, which is actually in a strip mall. There's a Ralph's Supermarket only 100 feet from the entrance. We stride through the doors past a bouncer reclining against a walkway rail. He nods at Junior and Pepe, and I put my head down and follow them in, wondering, "Should I have nodded at that guy?" Inside, the bar is a cross between a nightclub and a bingo parlor. There's a jukebox in the corner and a well in the middle, but the rest of the place is random smattering of tables and barstools separated by uncomfortable distances. The crowd is mixed, about half Latino and half white, with the white clientèle checking in somewhere between 40 and 50 years old. Somehow, this makes me relax, which I uneasily take as a measure of my age.

Pepe and Junior scan the bar for their friend, the bartender. She's not there. I'm just standing there like a dummy while the two of them deliberate about what to do. For a minute I think we might leave, but then we choose a hightop table near the door, and Junior sets out for our drinks. I tell him to get me a Coors, and he wrinkles his nose and lets out a "bah!" But I'm sticking to my guns. Not out of some loyalty to Coors, but rather wanting to keep my dignity. They're out of Coors, though, so I go with a Corona, which registers on Junior's face as a slight improvement.

Junior brings back our drinks and lifts his Pacifico bottle with a cocked head. I look from Junior to Pepe, then elevate my Corona. The irony does not escape me that this is the first and best welcome Southern California has offered me, and that it comes from two brothers, one 21 and the other 37, who are teaching me to be a waiter.

We clink our bottles to Junior's toast: "To . . . for the Hell of it."

For the Hell of it.

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